Keith read this book first because he saw the trailer for the movie. I had no intention of reading it until one day, he was taking a long time to go somewhere and the book HAPPENED to be sitting on the counter next to me. I started reading on a Thursday night, and finished it Sunday evening.

I love books like this. The ones that are impossible to put down. I read in every spare moment, in the bathtub, while I was cooking dinner, at bed time, waiting at the eye doctor with my mom. I just read and read.

LOVED every second of it. The first chapter had me so involved that I couldn't stop reading.

Then it gets REALLY good, there is a little love, a little fighting, and a lot of really great story lines.

When I saw this book, I was like "Oh great, another Hunger Games knock-off, but BOY was I wrong. This was nothing like the Hunger Games and dare I say, it was even better.

Synopsis:
In this post-apocolyptic world, society is divided into five factions.

Abnegation (the selfless)

Erudite (the knowledge seekers)

Dauntless (the brave)

Amity (the peacemakers/peacekeepers)

Candor (the honest)

Tris is a young Abnegation girl who has reached the age where she must take the Aptitude Test to determine which faction she truly belongs to. I won't spoil it.

She takes the test, and chooses a faction. Then she makes some friends, and has to go through initiation. She finds a boy named Four, and he is awesome ((I told Keith that I have a fiction crush on him) and I actually had a dream about him last night!) He and she get through a bunch of stuff, and then crap gets real.

I can't tell you anymore because I don't want to spoil it. So go read this book because I give it a 5/5 stars!

It is so well written, and the way Veronica Roth describes and writes about things, it makes it seem like I am there, and I can actually see and feel everything that happens.

The movie came out on March 21, 2014. I plan to write a review on the movie as soon as I see it.

Yesterday, I interviewed for a job that I wanted. Don't get me wrong, I love my current job, but this job I was interviewing for was a pay raise and a good opportunity.

I felt like I did really well on my interview.

I went home and waited, 3 hours later, I got the call.

I didn't get it.

They chose someone else.

As a human, rejection of any kind is hard. It is especially hard when you're hormonal, and pregnant, and felt like you did really, really, well in the interview.

So I cried. Uncontrollably. My husband hugged me, and tried to make me feel better, but I just needed to cry.

My mom bought me a Snow Shake from the cute new shack in town. And then I was done crying.

I know I did well, and I will do better next time.

Bonus, I get to keep my office, my job, and I get to continue working with the friends I've made at my current job.

I just thought I would share my motto with all of you. Because its okay to cry. It's okay to be sad, and have a melt down. But then, when you're done crying. You need to pack up your pity party and move on.

When I decided to read this book, I had heard a lot about it. I remember when Elizabeth Smart got kidnapped, it was all over the local and national news, and it hit especially hard since I live in Utah, and am just a few years younger than Elizabeth.

I started reading and was almost immediately enthralled in the story. It was captivating. BUT, this book is not very well written. In other reviews I've read, the blame is on the Ghost writer Chris Stewart.

There are WAY too many exclamation points, and it is written in a very naive tone.

The story is amazing, and I really enjoyed the book. The writing style was just not quite my forte`.

The book is also written so that it seems like the entire time, she is trying to convince readers and herself that she doesn't nor did she ever have Stockholm Syndrome (when a kidnap victim feels some sort of affection or attachment to her captors.) I don't feel like she needed to explain herself so much. She was a child, she was afraid for her life. The end. I felt like she spent most of her time explaining why she did what she did, and that she was acting out of fear, not out of affection.

It did keep me at the edge of my seat. She has many close encounters where she was ALMOST rescued, but something always stepped in the way.

Synopsis:
Elizabeth Smart was a young Mormon girl from Utah who was taken from her bed that she shared with her sister. She was taken in the middle of the night by a man named Brian David Mitchell. He claimed to be "Emmanuel, prophet of the lord" He insisted that the lord had commanded him to take Elizabeth to be the first of 7 virgin child brides. He took her, married her, and abused her for 9 months while his wife, Wanda Barzee helped conceal his secret, and watched the abuse.

They lived in the mountains in a secluded camp above Salt Lake for a while, and then as winter approached, they left Utah for the warmer weather in California.

During this 9 months several people approached Mitchell and inquired as to Elizabeth's identity, but somehow, Mitchell would always get out of it...

Great story. Writing Style... not so much.

Over all, I give this book 2 1/2 out of 5 stars.

I would recommend this book for the story line, but not for the writing style.

My shower is this weekend, I am so excited. My cute Sister-In-Law has planned the whole sha-bang, and I know its going to be awesome.

Looking forward to seeing lots of family! Thats always the best part about showers.

Keith is psyched, as always and continues to prepare for our little boy to join us.

Mazee however, is less excited. I think she can tell that something is changing, and it is happening soon because she doesn't want anything to do with me. She only wants Keith.

The other day, I picked her up from my parents house and brought her home. I got home before Keith, so I just brought her with me. She spent the hour before Keith got home running through the house looking for him. Then after she ran through every room, she would go to the door and pout. Then go look for him again.

I tried to hold her, and coax her to come sit on my lap, but no such luck. She only wants Keith.

Have any of you had a fur baby, and then a human baby? How did you help them adjust?

Okay, now onto the baby bump picture!

I feel like he is starting to drop, the bump looks smaller than 2 weeks ago for some reason...

There are probably 100 blog posts on how to clean a microfiber couch...

But this one... is awesome... because it ACTUALLY worked... most things in my life don't work out quite as splendidly as this did.

I did a WHOLE lot of research, because I really loved these microfiber couches, and they were well within our budget. But these poor dears needed a lot of work.

Just so you can see how much love these needed. This is the love seat before I cleaned it...

After a whole lot of research, I discovered all couches have cleaning codes. I didn't know this. Ours was located
under the cushion on one of those "do not remove under penalty of law"
tags

This couch was VERY luckily "W" so I decided to use my favorite cleaning supply... DAWN BLUE DISH SOAP!!!

Seriously, this stuff is magical, and SUPER inexpensive. Dawn blue works the best. I wouldn't skimp and use the no-name brand, dawn is pretty cheap.

I filled a water-bottle with hot water, and put about a tablespoon of Dawn Blue Dish Soap in it.. (maybe a little more, I get carried away). Then swirled it around to mix it up.

So I soaked the cushions and scrubbed them with a sponge.

Then, I let it dry. It looked okay, but they were really, really stained.

So I unzipped the covers, and made my husband pry them off (they were kinda tight) and then we threw them in the washer with some gentle Tide detergent (not very much, not even quite half a cap-full)

Then I threw them in the dryer on cool for a few minutes, not enough to get them dry, but just enough to start the process. Then I made my wonderful hubby squeeze them back onto the cushions. They were gorgeous.

Here's a before and after:

After one gentle cycle in the washer, I was so pleased with the results!

I started on the couch, same process. I soaked the couch with my dishsoap and water solution. Then scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed. Then I borrowed my moms handy-dandy carpet cleaner with an upholstery attachment, and sprayed clean water on it until it was saturated.

Then I used the attachment to suck up the water, AND DIRT (it was way way dirty water).

I sucked it up until little to no water came out of the couch, and then I made sure to go over it one more time to make all the fibers go the same way.

Then we let it dry overnight.

When we woke up, It was so clean, it looked like a new couch!

[insert clean picture of love seat here]

The fabric on the arms was a little stiff, so I vacuumed it with the upholstery attachment on my vacuum. Now it is soft and new!

Isn't it so pretty?

It makes my living room look much bigger and cozier! (which is what we are aiming for)

I've also learned that regular maintenance really is the key to clean microfiber. Vacuum your furniture with an upholstery attachment once a week (or at the very least once a month) to avoid ground in dirt and grime. Clean wet spills immediately, using as little water as possible.

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About Me

I met my wonderful husband in the summer of 2007 and knew that he was something special. We started officially dating in spring of 2008 and have been together ever since. We were married in August of 2012, and are expecting our first child in April of 2013.
I love to craft, DIY, and spend time with my family.